Editorial: Secrecy carries a price

Tuesday, Nov. 3, 1998 | 11:37 a.m.

The lawsuit filed by workers who said they may have been exposed to harmful amounts of hazardous waste at Area 51 has met its end. On Monday the U.S. Supreme Court let stand a ruling that threw out the lawsuit, which alleged the burning of toxic waste caused fatalities and serious injuries at the top-secret Air Force base near the Nevada Test Site.

It's shameful that this lawsuit met this outcome without resolving whether the government harmed its workers. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals cited the legal privilege given to military secrets in upholding the dismissal of the suit in January. The appeals court said workers and widows didn't have the right to find out what hazardous materials exist at Area 51 and how they are handled.

The five former or current workers at Area 51, including two widows of men who once worked there, asserted that hazardous and toxic waste was burned there during the 1980s and workers were not given protective clothing. They contend that the waste was put in 55-gallon drums that were placed in open trenches and set on fire with the aid of jet fuel.

In addition to claiming the exposure caused serious injuries, the suit also charged that the exposure killed two sheet-metal workers. But the federal government didn't want to get into any details of what types of substances were kept there. To show how far the federal government would go, its attorneys wouldn't even acknowledge that Area 51 exists.

Too often the federal government has taken actions that have harmed its citizens in the name of national security. During the height of the Cold War, the government performed above-ground atomic testing at the Nevada Test Site. Those tests sent radiation fallout across the nation. Many "downwinders" living in Nevada, Utah and Arizona have attributed their cancers to these tests.

No one wants to disclose secrets that could result in other nations, including terrorist regimes, from getting hold of information that could result in harm to our national security. The problem in the Area 51 case, however, is that it was treated as an all-or-nothing scenario with national security concerns completely trumping the rights of government workers.

While the nation's highest court has offered its decision on the Area 51 workers' lawsuit, this shouldn't be the conclusion to this story. Congress needs to investigate and get involved, passing legislation to adequately safeguard the rights of these employees and make amends for past negligence.

The needs of legitimate national security concerns should be properly balanced with the rights of employees who work in sensitive government positions, protecting these workers from abuses. Doing nothing and maintaining the status quo is just plain wrong, making these government employees second-class citizens without adequate protection under the law.